A Second Date

The guy called like he said he would. This is the guy who didn't flinch when I ran up to one of his WWI model planes that he built from scratch shouting, “Oh, a toy!” The guy who watched me curl into a ball on his bathroom floor – the guy who I kicked out of the bathroom so I could be "left alone." The guy who still draped a comforter over my sorry self. The guy who stayed up for 2 hours watching TV while I slumbered in his bathroom. The guy who still checked on me every so often.

And he still called me enchanting.

My favorite dates are always the "flawed" kind. Seemingly flawed, that is. But in their imperfection or mishap, they are memorable. Most people will look at their significant other and boil it down to one endearing moment. Maybe it is on the first date or maybe it comes later. I remember one particular first date where I ended up getting "locked" out of my house. It was February and the door lock was frozen shut and we had to scale a back deck in order to climb through a second-story kitchen window. It was my Spiderman date and we laughed about it for three years. There was the other date who let my cat out the balcony and she had her own Spiderman adventure and she traversed the edge of an 11th story balcony to find her way down two apartment balconies. It took me a half a day to find her. It was everything to get her to come back once she found a balcony with furniture. We still laugh about the Lost Kitty Episode. And I have had those dates where the guy just didn't GET IT - the moment was only in my head. Like this date. Or this guy from the beach. To them I say, "Lighten up!" And then there are many dates I simply can't remember at all. I think we went to dinner and, oh yeah, we ate dinner. I think we met for coffee and, oh yeah, we drank coffee (which I don't even drink!). But I want to create a story - a backstory - and when you meet someone online it doesn't happen by just meeting for dinner or coffee or small-talk.

I have always wanted a guy who GETS IT. And so he did. In fact, I think my "charming" drunk ass is what did him in. Heh heh. If we had a boring vanilla let's-talk-about-what-you-like-to-do-for-fun-rather-than-show-you-what-I-like-to-do-for-fun kind of date - well, he and I would be bored out of our mind. And I am not sure there would be any attraction on my part.

So we talked about our first date on our second date. He wanted to know how I felt about it. I was honest.

“Heh. I’m surprised you called me.”

“You kidding? There was no question in my mind that I wanted to see you again.”

So we had a very nice dinner at a very nice Georgetown restaurant.

He wanted to know why we have never run into each other before. We live about a mile from one another. We frequent the same bars. We both did a beach house this summer. But I am a fatalist and I don't think we would would have connected this way had we met, say, over the summer even though I was "charming" drunk all the time and he was in character. But I was doing my own thing and my attractions this summer were of the purely physical kind. My attraction to him is very different. The physical is underneath - and after - everything else.

So the second date has since turned into a third date – lunch. A fourth date – dinner, a hockey game, and a Mav double date (!). And a fifth date – dinner at his place and a movie. So for those keeping score, that is five dates in two weeks with the SAME GUY. A guy who seemingly GETS ME. So I am starting to do the Freak Out Thing. Over-analyzing because past history dictates that One Should Not Get Carried Away. One Should Not Get Too Far Ahead. One Should Look In His Closet AND Under His Bed for His Skeletons. Because they are there. They have to be. Because, y’all? Quite simply put, I am being courted.

And how do I - the Cursed Dater - respond to this little development - of A Guy Who Does Everything Right? First, I get so excited I go out and spend $300 on lingerie. It's been a while. But now panic sets in because the credit card bill AND the fact that, of course, this will jinx it. Remember, I am superstitious (i.e., I never read my horoscope ahead of time). And then I call my girlfriends to analyze every excruciating detail of our last date to understand why it took him three days to call and not the usual two and when he doesn't make a plan for our next date I start to question whether he really likes me and when he put his hand on my leg he stroked it in a counter-clockwise motion instead of the usual clockwise and he didn't end our kiss with a soft one on the left cheek - or is the right cheek that he ends on....and -- my gosh, WHAT DOES THIS MEAN?! Then I go eat a whole meatloaf and a cheesecake and THEN I am looking at my new lingerie and thinking "my thigh goes in there?" and "I thought this was more flowy in the store" and "boy, that thong DOES really go up the crack." [Men, you really have no idea what goes on behind the scenes!]

So Mr. Second Date, calm a girl down and, um, keep doing everything right. What - you don't know what "right" is? Well, I can't tell you that - that is what my girlfriends are for.